1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to aerodynamics and flight dynamics devices. More particularly, the present invention teaches a powered aircraft device incorporating substantially cylindrical shaped and power rotated components for creating lift. Specifically, the current invention significantly reduces poor fuel economy and problems of acceleration to higher speeds associated with prior art Magnus effect rotor airfoils, by significantly decreasing drag forces associated with such acceleration.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
The present invention operates from the physics principle of the Magnus effect, which is most obvious when a rotating cylinder is moved in an inviscid fluid and generates a force at right angles relative to the stream line flow of fluid (such as air), this being perpendicular to the rotation axis, and as is well known in the art to physicists and engineers. The idea of using this effect in flight has its traces in history.
U.S. Pat. No. 1,927,538, issued to Zaparka (1933), teaches a means for producing an accelerated air stream in a plurality of different applications, including aircraft, dirigibles and ships. As regards to aircraft applications, a rotor airfoil is supported within the accelerated air stream, the surface thereof being driven at a rotational speed such as between three to four times that of the accelerated air stream. The rotor airfoil is propelled by the air turbines from a slip stream associated with the propeller or from an air stream passing the plane in the event of the motor being inoperative. A bevel gear arrangement is provided, for converting the driving force of the engine to the rotating force of the rotor airfoils.
Some designs utilizing rotating cylinders in aircraft and also in submarines, use the flowing fluid around the crafts to rotate the rotating bodies, and as opposed to using engine power directly. In such instances, there is no prediction for neutralizing of the reaction force to the rotation of the rotating bodies by the engine. Additionally, the lack of engine power in those designs causes a low amount of lift force generation.
Problems associated with earlier rotating airfoil devices include the low efficiency of rotating bodies in comparison to the conventional airfoils in generating lift forces with the same degree of energy input. A secondary problem includes the turbulent flow that appears at the back of the rotating bodies, which especially increases forward speed, likewise increasing drag force and decreasing speed thereby preventing acceleration and leading to lower efficiency in lift force generation in comparison to the conventional airfoils. Due to this problem, the machines which have been designed up to now have the problem of limited flying speed and acceleration in addition to the poorer fuel economy in comparison to conventional airfoil using aircrafts.
Other examples drawn from the prior art include U.S. Pat. No. 5,180,119, issued to Picard, and which teaches a vertical lift system created through tangential blowing of air jets channeled over the top of rotating (Magnus) cylinders. The part of the cylinder's surface swept by such a jet (useful segment) is delimited upstream by a nozzle “splitting” a sheet of air almost tangentially over the cylinder and downstream by a vane which will skim the surface of the cylinder and direct the jet away from the surface of the rotating cylinder.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,875,627, issued to Jeswine, teaches a propulsion system for accelerating and directionally controlling a fluid having a continuous dynamic surface for circulating through a fluid from an entrainment region where fluid is introduced to the dynamic surface to a thrust region where fluid is discharged from the dynamic surface. The dynamic surface accelerates the fluid proximate to the surface so as to produce a layer of accelerated fluid from the entrainment region through the thrust region. A motor is operatively connected to the dynamic surface for driving the dynamic surface. The separator plate has a leading edge for stripping the layer of accelerated fluid from the dynamic surface, and a substantially flat thrust face adjacent to the leading edge for directing the accelerated fluid in a desired direction. The separator plate is positionable with respect to the dynamic surface such that the leading edge is generally in close proximity to the dynamic surface, and the thrust face is substantially tangential to the dynamic surface for at least a portion of the thrust region.
A final example drawn from the prior art is set forth in U.S. Pat. No. 4,582,013, issued to Holland, and which teaches a self-adjusting wind power machine for economical recovery of wind power and which employs a self-adjusting mass-balanced aerodynamic blade weathervaning freely around a lengthwise pitching axis forward of its aerodynamic center, and an aerodynamic roller in its leading edge, spun at a high RPM by a motor. The roller controls aerodynamic performance to high levels of efficiency at high lift coefficients, employing novel roller/airfoil profiles. In marine applications, the self-adjusting blade with roller stopped acts like a furled sail, with the blade held angling to the wind with the roller spinning. On a horizontal axis wind turbine, the self-adjusting blade is continuously held to an efficient angle of attack by centrifugal lift-increasing pitching moments balancing aerodynamic lift-decreasing pitching moments. The blade whirls steadily despite fluctuations of wind speed and direction, reducing stresses and preventing structural damage of loss of efficiency.